


We Can Make It Easy

by aknightley



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Domesticity, Fluff, M/M, a day in the life, post-trk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-06
Updated: 2016-07-06
Packaged: 2018-07-21 20:10:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7402171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aknightley/pseuds/aknightley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A day in the life of Adam living at the Barns. </p>
<p>  <em>Adam's ear caught the sound again, and he stiffened in alarm before his brain finally caught up and recognized it. He rolled his eyes at himself and at his life. It was the fucking cows. </em></p>
            </blockquote>





	We Can Make It Easy

**Author's Note:**

> I live in a country-esque area of the south, but not on an actual farm. This is extrapolated based on my own experiences and I've filled in the gaps with the magical phrase "Ronan dreamed this shit so I can be as imprecise as I like." Just an excuse to write more cute stuff. Dedicated as always to Meela, who is probably wondering why I'm uploading this before a. letting her beta it and b. before the roadtrip fic, which she's already looked over. Listen. I don't know, Meela. This is how it is.
> 
> Title is from Childish Gambino's song "So Fly."

Adam's eyes jerked open and he lay paralyzed in bed. For a moment he thought he had been having a nightmare, but he hadn't -- the last vestiges of his dream were already slipping away, but he could remember Ronan's hand smoothing over the freckles on his shoulder and his body was pleasantly flushed with heat, so it wasn't that a bad dream had woken him. He lay there for a while, skin buzzing, trying to orient his mind and body together. Next to him, Ronan huffed a breath against the side of his face and tightened his grip around his waist. 

Adam's ear caught the sound again, and he stiffened in alarm before his brain finally caught up and recognized it. He rolled his eyes at himself and at his life. It was the fucking cows. 

They'd woken up him up before, but it never failed to annoy him all over again. He squinted through the gray light slipping through the window curtains and decided it was just before sunrise. Ronan had apparently dreamed cows that thought they were roosters. Ronan himself, of course, slept through the noise like a true farm boy, rubbing his cold nose against Adam's bare shoulder. Adam was unimpressed, but also quietly charmed; this was common when dealing with Ronan.

It was a Saturday, and he didn't have a shift until the afternoon. He slumped down into the pillow, pressing his body more firmly against Ronan's chest, trying to draw his sleepiness back over himself like a blanket. He could fall asleep anywhere; he'd done it in Ronan's BMW, terrible electronic music blasting while Ronan drove him home from a late shift at work. He'd done it once against his will during a free period in school, where he'd meant to be studying but instead passed out under a tree while a bunch of Aglionby boys played a very obnoxious game of frisbee on the front lawn. A warm bed, Ronan's gorgeous body pressed against his, and the knowledge that he had nowhere to be and nothing to do for hours meant that Adam should be easily able to go to sleep again.

He was just feeling the drowsy edge of sleep creeping around his mind, breathing slowing, when the cows lowed again. It was a drawn out sound, louder this time, and Ronan made a sleepy noise when Adam sighed loudly. 

"Lynch," he whispered. Ronan's mouth curved slightly but his eyes stayed closed. "Ronan. Your goddamn cows are keeping me up." He pinched Ronan's arm when all he did was continue to pretend to be asleep. Ronan finally opened his eyes, blinking those long lashes at him and yawning obnoxiously in his face. 

"Parrish, they're just cows. Ignore them," he advised, wrapping the arm still around Adam tighter as if trying to keep him from leaving. He settled as if he were going to go to sleep again, but didn't close his eyes, choosing to stare serenely at Adam through his dark lashes. Adam fought to keep his face from flushing, but couldn't keep his eyes from rolling.

"Ignore them. Why didn't I think of that before," Adam said wryly. "How is it that I'm the one half-deaf and you can still sleep through that racket?" As if on cue, the cows called out again, a symphony of truly terrible mooing. Were they talking to one another? Was it a call for food or help or just boredom? Adam needed to do research on this shit. Then again, they were _dream_ cows. They could produce beer for all he knew. Ronan said that because they hadn't had calves recently they'd need to be bred before their lactation cycle could start again, so he was looking at fellow farmers for a good bull. Adam was decidedly turned on by Ronan's easy knowledge of animal husbandry and also knew immediately he could never let Ronan know.

Ronan lifted his hand from Adam's waist to stroke the curve of his ear. His fingers were warm from where they'd been on Adam's skin, and they were rough with calluses. " _Qui habet aures audiendi audiat._ " Adam exhaled a laugh at him, and lifted his own hand to touch Ronan's lips with his fingertips. 

"You're full of shit," Adam said, tracing the slice of Ronan's mouth and pulling at the corner so that it lifted into a forced smile. Ronan turned his head and snapped at Adam's fingers, biting one of them. He thought about pushing it further into Ronan's mouth, just to see what Ronan would do. "Should we go check on them? Since we're awake and all."

Ronan looked thoughtful for a moment and then rolled his body on top of Adam's, pinning him to the mattress. "Later," he said, and then leaned down to kiss Adam's mouth, Adam's throat, Adam's chest. Adam clutched at Ronan's shoulders and put the cows out of his mind; he couldn't hear them over the sounds they were making anyway.

 

"Opal, get that shit out of your mouth," Ronan snapped, and she guiltily pulled the feed bag away from her face and dropped it on the ground. "Jesus fuck," Ronan muttered under his breath, and Adam laughed. 

They were all out in the main barn, having released the cows out into the pasture and forked out tons of hay for them to consume. The sun had found its way above the horizon, casting bright pinks and oranges over the valleys and hills of the land that Ronan owned. Everything was dying, because of the impending winter, but it wasn't dying as quickly as it should have. The trees were still shades of orange and yellow and red, and the grass was still a pale, lovely green, where most of the surrounding area outside the Lynch property had already browned. 

"We gotta feed the chickens," Ronan said. "And gather the eggs. You ready to fight, Parrish?" He smirked at Adam and Adam stared back at him impassively. The hen house was on the other side of the big barn, tucked against the broad side and suspiciously quiet. Adam had never been in the chicken coop before, because Opal had always volunteered to go, but he couldn't exactly ignore the challenge inherent in everything Ronan ever said. He'd never been able to. 

Opal unhinged the door to the coop and stuck her head inside. "They're awake," she said promptly. 

Ronan picked up the bag Opal had dropped and took a handful of the feed inside. He made a clicking noise with his tongue and tossed the grains on the ground. The chickens immediately were at the door, heads bobbing, making their own soft clucking sounds. They were more sedated than Adam had thought they would be, but they were picking at the food at Ronan's feet as if they were ravenous. Ronan rolled his eyes and gestured at Adam.

Opal took Adam's hand and pulled him inside the coop. There was hay everywhere, and it smelled like birds and birdshit and something lighter, like dust or grass. She tugged him closer to one of the little nests raised up off the side of the coop and stuck her hand right into it. She came out with an egg that looked fairly normal to the ones Adam was used to seeing, but it was very slightly green, like it had been brushed with pale mint ice cream. She tucked it into the basket that she'd hung on Adam's arm earlier and waved a hand at him, as if to say, _Your turn._

He put his hand into the nest and felt the curve of the egg before he saw it. It was warm from where the hen had been sitting on it, and there were bits of straw sticking to it. Instead of green, it was very slightly pink. Not enough to be properly concerned about, but noticeable. 

"If he wants to sell these at the market he's gonna have to come up with a really good excuse," Adam told Opal, grinning when she shrugged her shoulders indifferently and went to find more eggs. 

"I'll make up some shit about foreign chickens," Ronan shouted from outside, and the hens clucked loudly as if in agreement. 

"Foreign chickens that shit rainbow eggs?" Adam called back, pulling a lilac one from the next nest, and then a blue that looked like the sky had this morning when he'd finally managed to drag himself away from Ronan's mouth and out of bed. 

"Makes sense to me," Ronan said. "Considering." 

Considering. Ronan had gone past his reluctance to accept himself and straight into belligerent honesty. All of the other farmers in the area were aware of teenage farmer Ronan Lynch and his boyfriend at this point, and Ronan's bluntness had left them no room to do more than grudgingly accept him. Some were less grudging than others, but this was still the south, and Ronan's age meant there were already reasons for them to dismiss him. His sexuality was just icing on the cake for some people. Adam was sometimes amazed at how Ronan had managed to insert himself into the community despite the push against him, but it was not altogether surprising that he had succeeded. Ronan was prone to inspiring the impossible. 

"They're pretty," Opal said, gingerly placing the last egg into the basket. 

Adam followed her out of the coop, blinking in the dawning light, glance catching on the breadth of Ronan's shoulders under his black sweater and the way his eyes gleamed bright blue as he looked back at Adam. The hens were still at his feet, pecking at the ground, and he stepped around them to come peer into the basket. His body radiated warmth along Adam’s side.

"Yep," Adam said to Opal, still staring at Ronan. "My thoughts exactly." 

Ronan didn't acknowledge him, but the top of his ears were pink.

 

They finished up the morning chores quickly and ate a quick breakfast (scrambled eggs, which were thankfully colored like regular eggs on the inside and tasted completely normal). Opal was allowed to mess around in the hay field on her own, and Ronan told Adam he was going to repair a fence that some of the deer had broken. "You can come with, if you want," he said, raising his eyebrows at Adam suggestively. Adam weighed the chances of Ronan actually meaning they were possibly going to fuck in the grass, decided Ronan was being, as usual, completely sincere, and then realized he didn't mind the idea at all. Possibly Ronan was ruining his sense of propriety.

There was an old, rusty truck with a flat bed that had been parked in one of the older barns next to a slightly newer tractor. Ronan filled it with fence material and nails and tools and patted the seat next to him. Dust rose up off of it. 

"Does this thing run?" Adam said doubtfully, and Ronan turned the key. It came to life with a purr that belonged on a vehicle worth twenty times this truck. "Okay, then."

They drove out over the pasture, bumping slightly over the uneven ground, the only sound Ronan's whistling. It took Adam a third loop of the same refrain for him to realize it was the murder squash song. He slid his eyes over to where Ronan was driving and found a crooked grin waiting for him. "Ronan." 

"Just keeping it interesting for you, Parrish," Ronan said, slowing down as they came up to the damaged section of fence. One of the rails had been knocked loose and broken in half, and the post was listing to the side slightly. Ronan parked the truck and hopped out of the cab. "Don't want you to get bored."

Adam paused in getting out himself, looking at where Ronan was pulling the tools out of the back of the truck bed and ambling over to the broken fence. Was that Ronan just casually speaking, or was that something he genuinely worried about? Ronan's nonchalance had always been a good way for him to cover his feelings up; Adam had thought he was getting better at recognizing the difference between joking and seriousness, but this was hard to parse. He decided to proceed cautiously. 

He followed Ronan up to the fence, hooking his arms over Ronan's shoulders and leaning his head over to survey the fence with him. He felt Ronan's back lift against his chest as he breathed in and out. "Like I could get bored out here," Adam said easily, pulling Ronan against him briefly and then letting go. "How do you wanna brace this post?"

Ronan cleared his throat. "Let's clear the old rail out of the way first."

They worked together, bracing the post with some kind of dream mixture that set up immediately when Ronan snapped his fingers, putting the new piece of wooden rail up and hammering it into place. They even managed to hang it straight, bickering over raising and lowering it until it ran parallel to the board that was beneath it. The sun was hot in the sky above their heads but the air was crisp and cold with the snap of fall, and Adam was barely sweating when Ronan declared the fence "good enough" and recklessly threw the hammer into the truck bed. 

"Jesus, Ronan," Adam said, putting the rest of the tools on the tailgate more sedately, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand absently. He was about to continue to tell Ronan off, just for the easy camaraderie of it, when he felt hands wrap around his waist from behind. 

"What, Parrish?" Ronan asked, slipping his hands under Adam's shirt and sliding up the damp skin of his hips to his ribs. His fingers dug in slightly, and Adam imagined little fingerprints appearing on his skin -- Ronan Lynch was here, here, _here_. He leaned back until Ronan's chest was flush with his back, resting his head on Ronan's shoulder. 

"What if your neighbors see?" Adam whispered, smiling. He probably wouldn't have cared if there had been a row of people on the other side of the fence they'd just fixed. He sometimes wanted to drive through Henrietta shouting out the window, _Ronan Lynch thinks I'm worthy of his love and that means everything to me,_ wanted everyone to know that he was finally, finally important to someone, and that someone was important to him. He'd gone so long without the easy affection that Ronan gave out like it was as natural as breathing, and he'd been afraid he would never be able to replicate that kind of attention. 

Adam had always been a quick study, though, and Ronan was a very, very patient teacher when it came to things other than learning to drive stick.

"There's no one for at least another sixty acres, Parrish. You can scream all you want," Ronan said, and his mouth pressed against Adam's throat and slid down to the place where his neck met his shoulder. It was nice, not being able to see exactly what Ronan was doing, and Adam was thinking about how pleasant it might be to just lazily make out with Ronan in the tall grass when Ronan fastened his teeth to the skin and bit down. 

Adam made a sharp noise, half-surprised but also not, not really. He knew Ronan well enough by now. "Ronan," he said, reaching a hand behind him to grab the back of Ronan's head and hold on. "Are you -- fuck," he gasped, when Ronan licked the mark and kissed his way back up to Adam's jawline. "I can't -- let me go so I can touch you." 

Ronan's hands loosed their grip from where they'd settled around his waist and Adam spun around in the circle of his arms. Ronan's mouth was slightly wet and his eyes were sparking like flames in his face. Adam gave himself a moment to be overwhelmed by how much he _wanted,_ and then he gave Ronan a push and followed him down to the ground. 

He straddled Ronan's body, laughing when Ronan began snickering at the clouds of dust that floated around their heads. He leaned down and kissed Ronan's open smile, fisting the fabric of his shirt and shuddering when Ronan's hands immediately latched onto his hips and slid down to his ass. 

"How long," Adam breathed between messy kisses, "before we have to be back?" He let go of Ronan's shirt so he could put his hands on either side of Ronan's head and hold him still, thumbs brushing the hard line of his jaw. 

Ronan shoved his hands down the back of Adam's jeans and Adam jumped -- his fingers were a little cold, and then they grabbed a hold of his skin and Adam bit back a groan just because he knew Ronan would laugh. "An hour, at least," Ronan said, and gave a sudden push that had Adam on his back, blinking up at the blue-gray sky and Ronan's wide grin. Adam had only ever felt this giddy, reckless joy with Ronan, doing stupid things with Ronan because he _could_ , because there was no reason to not be happy and alive when you felt like it. They'd both spent so much of their lives miserable and alone, and now they weren't. Ronan was warm where his body was pressed against Adam's, a line of heat and comfort keeping him tethered to the earth.

"I'm sure we can find something to do," Adam said, and pulled Ronan back down to kiss him again.

 

They made it back to the farmhouse with grass all over their clothes and hair and very unfortunate stains in their underwear, which made for a very itchy ride in multiple ways. Ronan told Adam to take a shower while he went to find Opal, since he would be going into work in just a couple of hours. Adam gave him a good luck kiss before heading upstairs, because Opal was known for exploring the fields when given a chance; once it had taken them a breathless hour and a half before they found her taking a nap in an old hollow log. 

The shower was always hot here, and Adam luxuriated in the feeling of the aches from rolling around on the hard ground disappearing as the water hit his skin. He'd brought his own shampoo to the Barns since Ronan didn't use any, but he shamelessly stole Ronan's woodsy scented body wash, thinking about smelling like him all day long at work, soaking the scent into his skin. 

When he dressed and headed downstairs, it was ominously quiet. Adam walked around the kitchen, contemplating what to eat before he headed back into town, when he heard a rhythmic knocking outside. He opened the back door to see Opal throwing a tennis ball against the side of the barn, while Ronan wandered around the garden in the backyard with a huge plastic bowl, sticking cucumbers and squash into it from the beds where they were growing. 

"Hey," Adam called, wandering outside. His hair was still damp, and he shivered, even in his sweater, which was probably more threadbare than he'd realized when he put it on. Ronan gave him a look when he glanced up, unimpressed.

"There's like a dozen jackets inside, Parrish. Go put one on and then you can come contribute." Ronan turned back to the squash, and Adam fought back his annoyance. _Don't snap at him,_ he thought. _Think about it._ He was cold, Ronan knew he was cold, Ronan was trying to solve the problem, even if he was his usual gruff self about it. If he'd said the same thing to Opal, Adam wouldn't have blinked. It was just -- it was still hard for him to accept people telling him what to do, even when it was his own wellbeing they were concerned for. Sometimes it was hard to be out here, at Ronan's home and in Ronan's bed, and not feel like he was allowing himself to belong to someone, which was still frightening to him. 

_But_ , Adam thought, _Ronan belongs to me too._ He felt proprietary over every smirk Ronan threw at him, over every touch he could eke out of Ronan's hands and mouth, over Ronan's time and thoughts. He wanted Ronan, in every sense of the word, always. _Think_ , he thought again. 

Adam bit his lip, went inside, and pulled a jacket from the hall closet.

It was a leather one, definitely Ronan's, and there were plain cotton gloves in one of the pockets. Adam didn't put them on but he did stuff his hands into the pockets, feeling them warm immediately, then headed back outside. 

Technically there shouldn't be any crops to pick, this late in the year, but the Barns didn't operate that way. Ronan told Adam that this small, personal garden behind the house would provide fruit and vegetables all year round if they kept it watered and weeded. Ronan had moved on to picking blueberries from a small bush, so Adam stepped closer to him and watched. 

Ronan glanced at him and his mouth quirked on one side. "That's a good look for you." 

Just like that, Adam felt the last of his bad feelings dissipate. "Yeah? Should I shave my head too? Complete the whole look?" He tilted his head and fluttered his lashes at Ronan, who scowled. 

"Don't you fucking dare, Parrish." He moved over to the tomatoes, and Adam trailed behind him. "If you shaved your head what would I hold onto when we--"

"Ronan," Adam interrupted, reaching out to pinch his side. Ronan flashed a smile that was more teeth than anything else. "Just admit you like the way I look."

"I like the way you look," Ronan said immediately, and grinned wickedly when Adam blushed despite himself. Adam huffed a little, then turned to the cherry tomatoes, lifting vines and examining the fruit just to keep himself from meeting Ronan's smug face. "Are these ready?" he asked, because they looked red to him but he didn't want to pull them before they were ripe. Opal loved cherry tomatoes best, because they fit perfectly in her tiny mouth and she could burst them between her sharp teeth, like a little explosion. It was easy to remember she came from Ronan when she was snapping her teeth and laughing at the mess she made. 

"Yep," Ronan said, holding the bowl out to Adam. He pulled the ones he'd indicated, leaving the ones that were still red orange, marveling at the ones that were still green and the buds that indicated more were coming. This place was full of so much potential, like it was bursting at the seams with imagination. It was easy to forget what Ronan was capable of sometimes, but Ronan was _magic_. He could dream anything and everything into being, and he used his magic to create fresh crops in the winter, to light the night time with fireflies, to give Adam flowers in the mornings, petals somehow intact despite the crush of their bodies. 

It was humbling and overwhelming to know that someone could have anything and they'd chosen you.

They picked blackberries, and peppers, and a few herbs that Ronan kept in a raised planter. There was a large box that held a sprawling mass of peppermint, and Adam knew it was there because it reminded Ronan of Gansey more than any need to actually cultivate it. 

When they went inside, the sun had fallen behind the clouds and they were all pink-cheeked from the cold. They threw together sandwiches, using tomatoes and lettuce from the garden, eating standing up at the counter and nudging each other periodically just to have an excuse to touch. Adam winced and Ronan watched avidly as Opal munched her way through the pits from the peaches they had after they'd cleaned up. 

Adam lingered, but he couldn't put off leaving any longer. Work was still a necessity, and he needed to grab a few books from St. Agnes. It occurred to him that he hadn't stayed there in a couple of days, and that it was well out of his way to keep coming to Singers Falls, but he wanted to come out here. It was the same premise as jumping into shopping carts, or riding behind the BMW on a dolly, or rolling around in broad daylight under the open sky -- if it would make him happy, he wanted to do it. 

"See you tonight," he said as Ronan walked him to the front door, "Try to make sure Opal goes to bed at a normal time?"

"Yeah, yeah," Ronan said, and tugged Adam in by his belt loops to kiss him goodbye. His hands wrapped around Ronan's neck out of habit, and his stomach went hot and liquid, thinking of how he was already getting used to something like this. It was terrifying, and wonderful, and a million other things that Adam had once thought his body couldn't contain. 

Ronan finally pulled back. "Get a move on, Parrish. Wouldn't want you to be late." He took Adam's hand in his, lifted it to his mouth to kiss his knuckles, and then nudged him out the door. Adam wanted to go back inside and pull Ronan to the couch, convince him to light a fire in the fireplace and spend the afternoon napping and dreaming and holding each other. He squared his shoulders and headed to the Hondayota instead, already thinking of coming back.

 

It was almost midnight by the time he was pulling into the gravel parking area in front of the house. His body was tired, but he was buoyed by the knowledge that he was finally home and could rest until tomorrow morning when Ronan woke for Sunday mass. 

The porch light was on, as it always was, and there were fireflies lighting the path up to the steps for him. Ronan wasn't at the door today, but Adam heard noise in the living room, and followed it to find Ronan sitting on the ground, feeding a log into a fire. 

Adam must have made a noise, because Ronan turned around on his heels and raised his eyebrows at him. "Adam," he said, voice low and warm, "Hey." 

Adam felt his heart skip at the look in Ronan's eyes. It was like the first time he'd noticed Ronan staring at him all over again, that rush of _maybe, maybe,_ of sudden realization and potential. "Hey," he whispered back. He joined Ronan on the ground next to the fire, the heat from the flames immediately flushing his cheeks and chasing the lingering cold from his fingertips. The fire was loud, crackling in his ear, but he could hear the crickets and frogs outside singing their cacophony of nighttime songs, something he'd thought he was used to from the trailer park, but they seemed louder out here. 

"How was town?" Ronan asked, taking one of Adam's hands as soon as it was within reach, smoothing his fingers over the bits of grease Adam hadn't managed to wash away. Adam felt the automatic clench of shame, but Ronan seemed to _like_ when he was dirty, had confessed that the smell of gasoline that followed Adam around turned him on, which was vaguely embarrassing itself, but was so _Ronan_ that Adam couldn't be anything other than a little pleased. 

"Town," Adam said, tipping his body to the side until he was pressed against Ronan, settling his head on his shoulder. "Gansey and Blue say hi. They were taking Henry to Monmouth for more roadtrip research." Ronan made a noise that Adam couldn't interpret, but it didn't sound unhappy.

"You hungry?" Ronan asked, still rubbing his fingers over the bumps and valleys of Adam's knuckles. Adam was getting warm between the fire and his sweater and Ronan's body heat, but he shook his head. 

"Can we just stay here a minute?" he asked, smothering a yawn into Ronan's shirt. "I just wanna -- I just wanna sit here a while." He wanted to absorb the feeling of being here, warm and satisfied and sleepy but not exhausted, not lonely or lost. He knew college was months and months away, but he was already trying to commit every moment between here and there to memory, something to get him through the weeks he'd be far away from this place he'd come to love. From Ronan. 

"Whatever, Parrish," Ronan said, and rested his head on top of Adam's, still holding his hand. They sat quietly in front of the flickering fire for a while, not speaking or moving except for Ronan stroking his thumb back and forth over Adam's hand. Eventually, Adam sighed.

"Okay," he said. "Bed." 

Ronan stood up first, stretching his body until his back popped; Adam watched with lazy interest as his stomach was revealed and then hidden again, vividly remembering putting his mouth to the sharp hipbones that just showed over the top of his dark jeans. Ronan stretched a hand down to help him up and Adam flashed back to staring blindly into his headlights, Ronan's pulse fluttering under his wristbands, Ronan leaning in and gazing deeply into his eyes to see if anything was wrong with them. He wondered if Ronan was remembering the same thing when he grasped his palm and pulled himself to his feet.

They made their way upstairs, past the closed door where Adam knew Opal was sleeping in a pile of blankets and pillows, into the bathroom to brush their teeth side-by-side. Ronan was watching him in the mirror so Adam watched him back, neither of them bothering to be coy. 

In Ronan's room, the bed was still unmade from this morning, and when they fell into it they both shivered from the cold sheets. Ronan pulled the comforter up over their heads and they looked at each other in the dark; Adam couldn't see Ronan but he was intimately aware of his face and body, of the lines and angles that made him. Their breath was hot between them, filling the space, and Adam closed his eyes and leaned forward to press his mouth to Ronan, landing on the corner of his lips. He felt them lift into a smile. When the air under the sheets was warm again, Ronan lowered the blanket and the moonlight lit upon his lashes and cheekbones, casting him in a pale glow. 

Without speaking, Ronan turned his back to Adam and shifted until Adam wrapped an arm around his middle, both of them settling as they touched. Adam pressed his forehead to the back of Ronan's neck and breathed in, once, twice. Ronan smelled of the woods and smoke and just _Ronan_. Ronan's hand drifted to wrap around Adam's wrist loosely, and when he exhaled Adam felt as if his entire body had released, tension dissipating. He was indescribably comfortable, something that was still a marvel to him. 

He was just about to fall asleep, eyes heavy and drifting closed, when a cow outside mooed loudly, breaking into the regular nighttime noisiness. Ronan snorted softly, body shaking briefly with his mirth. Adam simply laughed, and tightened his grip, and held on. They both fell asleep smiling, pressed together tightly.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me at [apvrrish](http://apvrrish.tumblr.com) on tumblr. 
> 
> _Qui habet aures audiendi audiat_ means "he who has ears to hear shall hear."


End file.
